Last Australian troops leave East Timor

Lindsay Murdoch, South-east Asia Correspondent, Dili

FIFTY of the last Australian infantry troops in East Timor boarded an RAAF C-130 transport aircraft today, ending a six-year intervention that has helped secure stability in the nation.

‘‘I’m looking forward to getting home, seeing the missus and having a beer,’’ said Private James Cerone, 20, from Narre Warren in Victoria as he boarded the plane for Adelaide,where his platoon is based.

Related Content

‘‘We have provided a secure environment for them to get on with their future,’’ Colonel Sasse said. ‘‘They can stand on their own . . . it’s time,’’ he said.

Australian troops were deployed to Dili in 2006 to help quell violent upheaval, forming a joint task force with New Zealand called the International Stabilisation Force (ISF).

Advertisement

But the task force has not been required to respond to violence since rebel attacks on former president Jose Ramos Horta and prime minister Xanana Gusmao in 2007.

Clinton Fernandes, a University of New South Wales senior lecturer and expert on East Timor, said the troops at first operated in a complex environment where they were confronted by barefoot teenagers armed with petrol cans to burn down houses.

He said the troops minimised interaction with Timorese ‘‘except under highly controlled circumstances, always watching for hidden weapons’’.

‘‘That might have been appropriate in Afghanistan and Iraq, but not in a place like East Timor,’’ he said. ‘‘But bad habits die hard.’’

Charles Scheiner, a founder of the Dili-based non-governmental organisation La’o Hamutuk, said the troops have mainly used East Timor for training for four or five years, keeping a low profile among Timorese.

The withdrawal of the Australians follows the winding-up of a United Nations mission on December 31, leaving East Timor to stand on its own for the first time in almost 500 years.

We have provided a secure environment for them to get on with their future . . . they can stand on their own.

The country was occupied by Portugal for more than 450 years and Indonesia for 24 years and was then under the shadow of successive UN missions.The deployment has cost Australia hundreds of millions of dollars.

Four Australians died while on the deployment, but none while responding to violence.